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“I feel awkward,” I blurt out.

He glances to the side. “About what we did?”

I nod.

He thinks and then sighs. “Sorry. I should have controlled myself.”

“I didn’t want you to.”

Silence. We drive, and when I dare to look at him, he’s smiling slightly. My heart skips a beat. Neither of us speak, but the tension eases a hint. He takes out his phone and connects it to the car, hitting the volume button, and the car fills with music. It takes me a second to realize what’s coming from the speakers.

“That’s Graceland,” I say.

He nods, getting on the long strip of tarred road. “Yeah. You like it?”

“Does anyone hate Graceland?”

He laughs once. “I mean, probably some people do.”

We both fall silent and listen. My gut wrenches a little bit. When I was a little girl, before Mom left, she had a record player Dad bought her for their second anniversary. It sat in the alcove in the kitchen. I always knew when she was cooking dinner, because the soft strains of Johnny Cash and Tracy Chapman would waft through the house with the smell of butter and garlic. The memory is bittersweet normally, but today, it’s not so bitter.

“You think Paul Simon classifies as country?” I ask.

He nods. “I think it’s a close cousin.”

I think about that. “I can never tell what’s folk and what’s country.”

“Well,” he says, taking a beat, “I reckon they overlap. But folk isn’t always country, if that makes sense.”

I think about it.

“I think folk is a form of country,” he adds. “Maybe country is more…flexible in intent. It can be heavily commercialized, but it’s hard to do that with folk.”

I’m out of my depth here, unsure what he means. He’s clearly thought on a theoretical level about all these things, which makes sense. This is his bread and butter, how he keeps the lights on. I just absorb.

“My sister is pretty good with music,” I say. “Better than me.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I’m more of a consumer. She plays guitar and sings.”

“Just for fun?”

“Well, yeah.” I shrug. “There’s not a lot of opportunity to do anything with all that out here.”

He’s quiet for a long time, thumb tapping the wheel. We slow down as the road tapers out and becomes a crossway. I glance left, then right. His jaw works.

“I think it’s right,” he says, reaching for his phone and swiping the screen.

I have no idea where he’s taking us, so I stay quiet. He nods and swings to the right, and we’re heading out to a lonely road that leads to an unincorporated community. I’ve been out this way a bit, but I wouldn’t say I’m familiar with it. There’s really nothing out this way.

“You have an address?” I ask lightly.

He nods. “It should be…right here.”

He pulls the truck to the side of the road, where there’s an overgrown drive. The stretch of grass is empty, save for a spot of exposed red clay and a few boards. To the left is a rotted out tree stump. Silent, he swings out of the truck. I jump out but hang back as he moves across what clearly used to be a lawn. A little pit of sadness forms in my stomach.

This was his home.